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Have We a Portrait of Columbus ? 



ANNUAL ADDRESS 



BEFORE THE 



American Geographical Society. 

JANUARY 9, 1893. 
By the President, Charles P.* Daly, LL.D. 



■-■'•3R*#Ji«'- 



HAVE WE A PORTRAIT OF COLUMBUS?;^ 

ANNUAL ADDRESS, JANUARY 9, I 893. 

BY 

CHAS. P. DALY, LL.D. 

William Roscoe, the eminent author of the Life of 
Lorenzo de Medici, the " Magnificent," and of other 
valuable biographical works, expresses the opinion that 
there are no representations which interest so strongly 
the curiosity of mankind as portraits. That a high degree 
of pleasure, he says, of which almost every one is sus- 
ceptible, is experienced in contemplating the looks and 
countenances of those men who, by their genius, or 
their virtues, have entitled themselves to the esteem 
and admiration of future ages. 

It appeared to me, therefore, as we have recently 
celebrated the four hundredth anniversary of the dis- 
covery of this Continent by Columbus, that it would 
be appropriate at such a period to devote the annual 
address of the president of an American geographical 
society to the enquiry whether we have any portrait 
of the great discoverer. It is an enquiry to which I 

* Reprint from the "Bulletin of the American Geographical Society." Vol. 
XXV., No. I, 1893. 



2 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

have given attention for some years. I have seen 
both here and in Europe very nearly all the pictures 
claimed to be his portrait. I have read everything, I 
think, relating to the enquiry that has been published 
and feel that I am able, at least, to lay before you all 
that is known upon the subject. 

It is a very difficult one, as is the case with so many 
things respecting Columbus ; for I doubt if any distin- 
guished man ever lived, about whom there is so much 
that is conflicting, contradictory and perplexing. 

Twenty-three places have been claimed to have been 
his birthplace. He said himself that he was born in 
the city of Genoa, and Mr. Henry Harrisse, after an 
exhaustive research, has, I think, established that this 
was true, and yet there are some who still maintain 
that he was not born in the city of Genoa, but in some 
village near it. 

The year of his birth is disputed. It has been ques- 
tioned whether the name by which he is known was the 
true name of his family. Mr. Harrisse has shown 
by documentary evidence who was his father and his 
grandfather, and the humble occupation they followed ; 
yet a recent writer, Harold Frederick, in the London 
Illustrated Nezvs, of October 12, 1892, says that the 
only credible information is that he was closely related 
to a notorious and blood-thirsty pirate, the terror of the 
merchant galleys of Venice, whose real name was un- 
known, and who, with "a grim piratical pleasantry," called 
himself "Colombo" or the Dove, a name adopted by 
his son, who surpassed his father in ferocity, and who 
called himself Colombo Giovane, or the younger, 
and that Columbus " seems to have spent most of his 



WBW YORK PU3L. LnM|' 
IM XXCHan , 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 3 

earlier life with "these Corsairs, his cousins, in their 
piratical fleet ; that with them he burned, murdered 
and pillaged, from the Tunisian coast to the Flemish 
dunes and ravaged in pious zeal the infidel seaboard." 
That with Colombo the Younger he bore his part in 
the great sea fight off Cape St. Vincent in 1485, and 
that "when the buccaneering Colombi disappear from 
human records the discoverer turns up, an impover- 
ished marine adventurer, in Lisbon, and enters upon 
a career of comparative respectability;" in respect to 
which it may be said that if there is anything certain 
about his early career, it is that he was in Lisbon and 
had lived there a married man for several years before 
the battle referred to was fought. 

What has hitherto been received as reliable, his life, 
by his son Fernando, and which has been the main 
source of what knowledge we have had of his earlier 
career, has been subjected to a critical examination by 
Mr. Harrisse, who has written a volume to show that it 
has been extensively tampered with and cannot be 
relied upon as authentic. 

His reception at Barcelona by Ferdinand and 
Isabella, of which such a glowing account is given 
in his life by Washington Irving, Aaron Goodrich^ 
in his life of Columbus, pronounces ** an exploded 
popular error," upon the authority of the late 
Charles Sumner, who in 1844 searched the admi- 
rably arranged archives of Aragon and of the city of 
Barcelona, for some record of such a prominent event 
and could find nothing respecting it. A diario, or 
day book, was kept at the time in Barcelona, in 
which the arrival of ambassadors, the movements of the 



4 Have we a Portrait of Columbus f 

king and queen, the public festivities and the trifling 
incidents, which in our day are found in court journals, 
were duly recorded, and yet, Mr. Sumner says, " not a 
word appears in it in regard to Columbus." 

And finally the place where his remains now repose 
is disputed, and during the past five years fourteen 
works, twelve in Spanish and two in Italian, have been 
published upon that subject. 

The same conflict and uncertainty exist with regard 
to his portraits. There is no portrait or pictorial rep- 
resentation of his person, that can positively be declared 
to be authentic ; nor is there any evidence upon which 
it can be asserted as a fact, that he sat for a portrait, 
and M. F. Feuillet de Conches, who wrote an article on 
the portraits of Columbus, in 1856, for the Revue Con- 
teinporaine^ asks : Is it presumable that Oviedo, his son 
Ferdinand, and after them, Benzoni and Herrera, would 
have entered into such a detail of his personal appear- 
ance, if there had then existed a portrait of him, to refer 
to? and Mr. Harrisse says that as to the portraits 
painted, engraved or sculptured, which figure in collec- 
tions, in public places and in the form of cuts, there is 
not one that is authentic. It is all pure fancy.* 

Notwithstanding this, I believe, that he did sit for a 
portrait and probably for more than one. It is my be- 
lief that we have his true lineaments, and my address 
this evening will be devoted to showing upon what that 
belief is founded. 

The fact, that up to this time, there is no portrait of 
Columbus that can be duly authenticated, explains 



*Christophe Colomb, Hen. Harr., Tome 11., p. i66. 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus ? 5 

why, during the latter part of the last century and 
throughout the present one, so many pictures have 
appeared that have been claimed to be original portraits 
of him, all of them differing more or less from each 
other; and what is remarkable is the credulity with which 
distinguished scholars and writers upon Columbus, 
and the events connected with him, have accepted some 
of these as genuine and had them engraved for 
their works without any evidence in support of them. 
Any one, in fact, has felt at liberty to believe and to 
persuade others, that some old portrait he has got 
possession of is an original portrait of Columbus. 
Painters, sculptors and engravers have also felt at 
liberty to offer anything as their conception of his 
true likeness, the result of which has been to produce 
the greatest confusion, and to warrant the assertion that 
no man probably has ever lived of whom there have been 
so many different representations in portraiture. 

Our associate, Mr. Ponce de Leon, who, like myself, 
has been for many years engaged in this enquiry, and 
to whom I have been indebted for much information, 
tells me that he has seen more than 450 different rep- 
resentations of Columbus. I have myself seen a great 
many, and about a month ago, in looking over my col- 
lection, Mr. Ponce de Leon found twelve that he had 
never seen before. 

Another explanation is that up to the present cen- 
tury no investigation was made. In 1823 Spotorno, 
an Italian writer, devoted a few pages to the subject, 
but what may be called an investigation was not 
undertaken until Don Valentin Carderera y Solano, an 
eminent Spanish painter and archaeologist, and author 



6 Have we a Portrait of Columbus ? 

of that great work on the Art Monuments of Spain, 
Iconografia Espaiiola, and other artistic works, alike 
distinguished for their learning and their accuracy, who 
knew more of the history of Spanish art than any one 
before him, published in 1851 a most valuable memoir 
upon the subject,* which was followed in 1856 by the 
paper of de Conches, to which I have referred. 

When the citizens of Genoa in 1842 contemplated 
erecting in that city a monument to Columbus, the 
municipality applied to the Spanish government to as- 
certain if any portrait of him was known in Spain, or 
for any information existing there on the subject. 
The government referred the matter to the Royal 
Academy of Madrid, and the Academy appointed a 
committee, of which Carderera was chairman, who in 
185 1 made a most exhaustive report, which the Academy 
published, giving everything that was then known either 
in Spain or elsewhere upon the subject, and laying 
down what must be the true line of enquiry in any in- 
vestigation thereafter for further information. 

Yet, notwithstanding the elaborate investigation of 
Carderera, and the concurrence forty years ago of 
Feuillet de Conches in its result, this confusion still 
continues, and we had an illustration of it, in the Cen- 
tennial Celebration in this city last October, in the 
appearance in shop-windows, upon the public build- 
ings, and in the streets, of a number of different-looking 
personages as Columbus. 

Many anecdotes might be given to illustrate the 
effect which all this has produced. One which I heard 

* Informe sobre los retratos de Cristobal Colon, su traje y escudo de armas por 
Don Valeniin Carderera. Madrid, 1851. 4to. 



Have we a Portrait of Colwmbus ? 7 

when I was in Seville in 1881 will suffice. There 
was in the library, left by Columbus' son, Fernando, 
to the Cathedral of Seville, a portrait of Columbus. 
An artist asked what was thought of it, and the custo- 
dian replied that it was one of the most reliable por- 
traits ; upon which the artist said : " I am glad to hear 
it, for I painted it from imagination, and exhibited it 
at the Exposition in Paris, at the close of which it was 
bought by a Spanish gentleman." 

As an aid in this enquiry, we have the description 
that has come down to us of the personal appearance 
of Columbus by those who knew him. It is not only 
very particular, but the five persons from whom it is de- 
rived substantially agree with each other. To this test 
therefore all pictures claimed to be true portraits of him 
must be subjected, and when it is applied it reduces 
them to a comparatively small number, and it is those 
only that I shall seriously consider. 

The earliest description of the person of Columbus 
is found in a work attributed to Angelo Trivigiano, en- 
titled " Libretto di tutta la navigazione dei Rei de 
Spagna, Venezia," 1504 (Account of all the Navigations 
of the Kings of Spain), in which he is described as a 
" robust man, of a tall stature, ruddy and with a long 
face." ^ 

The next description of him is given in- a collection 
of voyages entitled " Mondo Novo e Paesi Nuova- 
mente Ritrovati " (the New World recently discovered), 
attributed to Alessandro Zorzi, a cosmographer and 
cartographer of Venice, which was published in Vi- 
cenza in 1507, one year after Columbus' death. It con- 
tains a brief description of the great navigator, which 



8 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

is as follows: " This Christopher Columbus of Genoa 
was a tall, straight man, of great understanding, and 
long visage." 

The next is by Oviedo, who knew Columbus person- 
ally. He was a page of the king, with Columbus' son, 
Fernando, and was in Barcelona when Columbus came 
'to that city to meet Ferdinand and Isabella upon his 
return from his first voyage, and Oviedo saw him then. 

Ovieda says '' he was a man of honest parents and life, 
of good stature and aspect, rather tall than of middle 
height and with robust limbs. His eye was lively and 
the oX\\^r features of his face ^' were in good proportion ; 
his hair being red and his face somewhat ruddy and 
freckled." He says that " he spoke well, was wary and of 
great intelligence, a good Latin scholar and a most 
learned cosmographer " ; that " he was gracious, when 
he wished to be, but wrathful when aroused." f 

The next is by Las Casas. This is the most valuable 
of the several descriptions of him by his contemporaries, 
because it is the fullest, and by a man who knew him 
well in the latter part of his life. He says : " As regards 
his exterior and physique, he was tall, above the medium 
size ; his face was long and dignified; his nose aqui- 
line, his eyes bluish, his complexion inclining towards a 
glowing red. His hair and beard, when he was young, 
were fair, but very soon turned white with so much 
fatigue. He was witty and lively, speaking very well, 
but was eloquent and vainglorious when speaking of 
himself. He was serious with moderation, friendly to 
strangers, amiable and pleasant with the people of his 

* Harrisse erroneously translates it " other parts of his body." 
f Oviedo, Book II., c. 2. 



Have wc a Portrait of Columbus? 9 

household. With moderate gravity, he was discreet in 
conversation, and so he could gain easily the love of 
those who met him. Finally, he represented, with a 
venerable aspect, a person of great position and author- 
ity and worthy of all reverence. He was sober and 
moderate in his eating, drinking, dressing and shoe- 
ing."* 

His son Ferdinand's description of his father is this : 
" The Admiral was a man well-formed and of more 
than the medium stature ; of a long visage and with 
cheeks a little high, without inclining to fat or lean. 
He had an aquiline nose and light eyes. He was fair, 
with a lively color. In his youth he had blond hair, 
although when he reached thirty years of age it became 
white." t 

There is a description of Columbus by Benzoni, who 
never saw him. Benzoni went to the New World in 
1 541, thirty-five years after the death of Columbus, 
and remained there for fourteen years, and may have re- 
ceived the very particular description he gives from 
persons there who had known Columbus. I refer to it, 
not only because it agrees with the previous descrip- 
tions, but because it is of interest, as it is the only one 
that mentions that his mouth was a little large, a feature 
observable in what are known to be the^older portraits. 
He says, " He was a man of reasonable stature, of sound 
and vigorous limbs, of good judgment, of lofty mind 
and of gentlemanly aspect. He had lively eyes, red 
hair, an aquiline nose and the mouth a little large, and 



*Las Casas. Historia de Las Indias. Madrid, 1875. Vol. I., p. 43. 
f Vita di Cristoforo Colombo descritta da Ferdinando suo Figlio. Capitolo 
III., p. 12. 



lo "Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

above all he was a friend of justice, but wrathful when 
he was offended." * 

Andres Bernaldez, Cura de los Palacios, was an in- 
timate personal friend of Columbus, who was a frequent 
guest at his house. He gives in his " Historia de los 
Reyes Catolicos " (Vol. II., p. ']%^ the following account 
of Columbus, upon his return from his second voyage : 
" The admiral came to Castile in the month of June, 
1496, in a dress of the color of a Franciscan friar. It 
was almost exactly the shape or form of the dress of 
such a friar, with the cord of St. Francis around his 
waist, as an act of devotion." I refer to it, because in 
the earliest representation of his person, positively 
known, he is clothed in a dress of this kind. 

What we get from these descriptions is that he was 
a straight, well-built man, who was rather above the 
medium height, that he had a long visage and high 
cheek bones, but with the lineaments of his face well- 
proportioned ; that his eyes were light and piercing, 
his nose aquiline, and his complexion fair ; that in his 
youth his hair had been red, but became white when 
he was thirty ; which may be regarded as sufficient to 
test the authenticity of anything claimed to be a por- 
trait of him. 

A knowledge of the character of a man is of some as- 
sistance in judging of the genuineness of what is claimed 
to be his portrait. Many judge of the character of a 
person b}'' the face, the features or the general expres- 
sion. Women do so intuitively. But in the case of 
Columbus there is as much uncertainty about his char- 
acter as there is in so many things respecting him. 

* Benzoni, La Historia del Mondo Nuovo, Lib. i., p. 30. 



Have we a Portrait of Columbtis ? 1 1 

It would naturally be supposed that a biographer, 
after a full investigation of all that is known respecting 
a man. would be able to present a carefully considered 
and reliable statement of his character, but so far from 
this being the case, the conflict among the biographers 
of Columbus is not only greater but more extreme than 
elsewhere. 

More than sixty years ago, Washington Irving, in 
his life of Columbus, gave a carefully drawn sketch of 
his character, founded upon all that was then known 
respecting him. It is too long to quote entire, but I 
will give substantially the material part of it. In him, he 
says, were singularly combined the poetical and the prac- 
tical. His mind grasped all kinds of knowledge whether 
procured by study or observation ; while his daring, but 
irregular genius, bursting the limits of imperfect science, 
bore him to conclusions far beyond the intellectual 
vision of his contemporaries. He discerned the phe- 
nomena of the exterior world with wonderful quickness 
of perception, and the ability of quickly converting facts 
to principles distinguishes him from the dawn to the close 
of his sublime enterprise. He aimed at dignity and 
wealth in the same lofty spirit in which he sought re- 
nown. He was devoutly pious, religion mingling with 
the whole course of his thoughts and actions. He was 
a man of quick sensibility, liable to great excitement, to 
sudden and powerful impulses. He was naturally irrita- 
ble and impetuous; keenly sensible to injury and injus- 
tice, yet the quickness of his temper was counteracted 
by the benevolence and generosity of his heart. He was 
free from the feeling of revenge, ready to forget and 
to forgive, aud the magnanimity of his nature shows 



1 2 Have we a Portrait of Columbus ? 

forth through all the troubles of his stormy career. 
While Irving does not justify his enslaving the native 
population, he considers that he was goaded on by the 
mercenary impatience of the crown, the sneers of his 
enemies and the unprofitable result of his enterprises. 
That it was a blot upon his illustrious name and 
should be considered as an error of the times in which 
he lived.* 

Prescott has said that " Whatever the defects of 
Columbus' mental constitution, the finger of the his- 
torian will find it difficult to point to a single blemish 
in his moral character. That whether we contemplate 
his character in its public or private relations, in all its 
features it wears the same noble aspect. It was in 
perfect harmony with the grandeur of his plans, and 
with results more stupendous than those which Heaven 
has permitted any other mortal to achieve." 

In respect to these passages, the last American biog- 
rapher of Columbus, Mr. Justin Winsor, the librarian 
of Harvard College, assumes the responsibility of say- 
ing, especially in respect to the observation of Prescott, 
that it is difficult to point to a more flagrant disregard 
of truth ; that it seems to mark an obdurate purpose to 
disguise the truth, and that this " is nowhere more 
patent than in the palliating hero-worship of Washing- 
ton Irving." 

Upon a charge so severe and sweeping as this I feel 
that it is due to these two distinoruished American 
authors to mention that Humboldt told me in 1851 that 
there was then no historian in Europe that he would 
place above Mr. Prescott ; and as to Washington Irving's 

* Life of Columbus, Vol. II., B. iv., c. 5, Putnam's ed. N. Y., 1849. 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus f 13 

biography, Navarrete, who was certainly competent to 
judge, said, after it was published, that in fulness, impar- 
tiality and exactness it was superior to any that had 
preceded it,* and Mr. Harrisse, who was equally, and 
in view of what is now known, even more competent, 
and who is not given to undue praise, says, in a recent 
publication : f " The work of Washington Irving is more 
than literary. It is a history, executed with judgment 
and impartiality, which leaves far behind all descriptions 
of the discovery of the New World, published before, 
or since. He studied with care almost all the docu- 
ments that were known in his time, which testifies to 
the probity of his researches." 

In 1856 Roselly De Lorgues, a French writer, pub- 
lished a biography of Columbus, in which, in his esti- 
mate of his character, he transcends anything said by 
Irving, Prescott, or any other writer. " We see in him," 
he says, "a man who in virtue was perfect; of entire 
purity of heart ; who in moral grandeur surpasses the 
most celebrated types of antiquity and who is not in- 
ferior to the noblest heroes formed by the Gospel ; 
a man who from the nature of his mind and his religious 
character, partook more of heaven than of earth," and 
closes in these words : " To express our deepest con- 
viction, we declare before man who kijows it not and 
before God who knows, Christopher Columbus was a 
Saint," printing the last sentence in large capitals. J 

Whilst this French writer raises Columbus to an ele- 

* living's Life of Columbus, Vol. I. Preface, XVII. N. Y.: G. F. Putnam, 
1850. 

f Christophe Colomb, Vol. II., p. 163. 

:}: Histoire de Christophe Colomb par Roselly de Lorgues. Paris, 1S56. 
Tome II., pp. 443, 465, 472. 476. 



14 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

vation so high, a subsequent American biographer 
Aaron Goodrich, sinks him to a depth correspondingly 
low. He accuses him of cupidity, ingratitude, arro- 
gance, perfidy and treachery. He declares that his 
prevailing traits were hypocrisy and deceit, with which 
were combined cowardice and cruelty, and that it was 
from some such an original that Moliere drew his char- 
acter of Tartuffe ; that his tastes were brutal, that no 
character in history so successfully made a cloak of re- 
ligion, and that no depravity could be attributed to him 
that would be too gross for belief ; that the love of gain 
and not science or religion was his motive power ; that 
Gold was his God ; and winds up the chapter upon his 
character in these words : " We look in vain through 
his life for any trait or action that would endear him to 
the heart of men, for one deed that may be regarded as 
the impulse of a great and noble or of a generous heart ; 
we find nothing but low cunning, arrogance, avarice, 
religious cant, deceit and cruelty."* 

Winsor's observation upon this degrading picture of 
the great discoverer is, that " The critic's temper is too 
peevish and his opinions are too unreservedly biased 
to make his results of any value," f and gives his own 
estimate of Columbus, which is not a laudatory one. 
He describes him as "a creature of buffeting circum- 
stances," and "a weakling in every element of com- 
mand; " that while " not destitute of keen observation of 
nature, this quality was not infrequently prostituted to 
ignoble purposes;" that he was "a devout Catholic, 



* Goodrich's Life of Columbus, pp. 86, 131, 321, 350, 355, 358, 364, 370. 
N. v., 1874 

t Winsor's Christopher Columbus, p. 504. Boston and New Yoik, 1872. 



Have we a Port^'ait of Cohimbits ? 15 

according to the Catholicism of his epoch, but that when 
tried by any test that finds the perennial in holy acts," 
he does not bear examination ; that there was " no all- 
loving Deity in his conception," but " his Lord was one 
in whose name it was convenient to practise enormities ;" 
that while "he mourned bitterly that his own efforts 
were ill-requited, he had no pity for the miseries of 
others;" that " no man ever evinced less capacity for 
ruling a colony ;" that ** the problems he encountered 
were those that required an eye to command, with tact 
to persuade and will to coerce, and he had none of 
them;" whereas J. G. Kohl, the celebrated German 
traveller and scholar, in his " Discovery of America," 
with substantially the same facts before him, says that 
whilst " there was something visionary in Columbus' 
nature, yet when the time for action arrived he was 
never found wanting in decision and energy" ; and de- 
scribes him generally, as a man in whose organization 
were united physical energy and strong ideality ; that he 
had a glowing imagination, with which were combined, 
however, acute powers of observation and an earnest 
desire to gain experience ; tendencies so opposite, that 
in most men the imagination or the practical will pre- 
dominates, but in his case the proper balance was main- 
tained. Finally, Mr. Winsor says that, "no man craves 
more than Columbus to be judged with all the palliations 
demanded of a difference of his own age and ours," 
and then impairs the effect of this concession by saying 
that he considers it his duty at the same time, to 
judge the paths which he trod by the scale of an 
eternal nobleness.* 



* Winsor's Columbus, pp. 449 to 512. 



1 6 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

In this conflict I have asked our associate Fellow, Mr, 
Ponce de Leon, for his opinion, as he has read nearly 
everything relating to Columbus, and it is not very fav- 
orable. It is this : that he was a type of the Italian of that 
period, having no regard for the truth, when he thought 
it his interest to resort to falsehood, and who could play 
the hypocrite, as he did with Isabella, when he deemed 
it necessary ; that he was cringing to superiors and 
overbearing to inferiors, qualities usually combined, and 
was hated by nearly every one under him. While am- 
bitious of renown, he was avaricious and mean in money 
matters, wanting everything for himself He was out- 
wardly devout, but never suffered his religion to inter- 
fere with anything he wanted to do ; that he was a man 
of great energy and of an iron will, but was not cruel, 
and altogether a better man than most of those that he 
had to deal with ; that it is to be considered that what 
he often witnessed, the cruelties that the Inquisition 
inflicted upon the Moors and the Jews, and the sale of 
enemies and negroes as slaves, had made him callous 
to human suffering and indifferent to the rights of his 
fellow-men. Mr. Ponce de Leon thinks that after he 
was brought to Spain in chains, his mental faculties 
became impaired ; that he was thereafter sad, depressed 
and discontented, his correspondence during this period 
showing that he was not the man that he had been, and 
finally that he was not worse than his age, but upon 
the whole better, which, in respect to that age, he says, 
is saying a great deal. 

But as it is desirable, for the purpose already stated, 
that we should have, amid this conflict of opinion, the 
best idea of him that can be obtained, I have selected 



Have zve a Portrait of Cohcmbiis ? i 7 

what I regard as the broadest, the fairest and as a 
whole the most complete representation of him I know 
of, which is the one given by Peschel, the eminent Ger- 
man geographer and anthropologist, abridging it some- 
what in the translation 

He says : " What made Columbus so great was the 
stormy impulse of his age to pass beyond the boundary 
of the Old World, which had become too contracted. 
It was a restless longing toward the East and a keen 
desire for its treasures that possessed all seafaring peo- 
ple before the birth of the great Genoese, and Colum- 
bus possessed what was essential for such an undertak- 
ing — a keen sight for the phenomena of nature and a 
lofty power of conception, which bound together as in 
one what was most remote and even most improbable, 
with surprising intuitions and amazing errors. If the 
creations of his fancy were as real and as vital to him 
as his great intuitions, their tenacious growth was so 
interwoven with all his knowledge, that he never gave 
way before the learning and intelligence of his age, 
which held him for a madman ; nor wearied, though 
repelled with scorn, in hawking about from one Euro- 
pean court to another his vast design of a western way 
to the land of spices, and, though he knew it not, to an 
undiscovered world. Even after his great discovery he 
looked upon his deed as a miracle, his visions as the 
breath of a divine inspiration, and himself as the chosen 
instrument of a high decree. 

" ' Neither sagacity nor mathematics,' he says, ' nor 
charts profited me anything. It came about only in 
fulfilment of what Isaiah had said.' During an attack 
of fever on the coast of Nicaragua he thought that he 



1 8 Have we a Portrait of Columbus f 

heard a messenofer from Heaven who comforted him 
with a promise that all his hardships would be recorded 
in marble. He brooded over the prophetic chorus in 
the Medea of Seneca, in respect to what would take 
place beyond the Atlantic — [a prophecy made fifteen 
hundred years before its fulfilment and one of the most 
remarkable ever uttered by man, — which, translated 
from the Latin, may be rendered in these words : 

The time will come in far-off years 

When the Ocean shall loosen the bonds of Nature, 

And a great land appear, 

And the seaman discover tiew worlds. 

And Thule be no more the farthest land.] 

"Natures, Peschel says,which are deeply stirred within 
seldom have the gift of drawing strongly to themselves 
what moves and acts around them ; men approach them 
with reluctance, and do not feel their neighborhood to 
be genial, which explains why Columbus did not win 
the enthusiastic attachment of the Spanish adventurers 
who followed him. 

" Since we have been able, he says, by means of his 
written remains to draw nearer to this great man, as a 
man, we learn with pain that he was wanting in regard 
for the rights of his fellow beings. He hunted the 
aborigines with fierce dogs, treated them as property, 
the prizes of the finders, and distributed them to the 
holders of plantations, and gold-mines, thereby accom- 
plishing their extinction. When we see, however, in 
our own day how the rights of the weaker races are 
shamefully violated, we may have some indulgence for 
this man of the fifteenth century, though it is bitterly to 
be regretted that he is not to be counted with the noble 
spirits of his age, like Isabella and the brave Domini- 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus f \ 9 

cans of Hispaniola, who stood up and contended for 
the rights of the native population ; nor can we repress 
a feeling of impatience when this great man on every 
page of his writings, even in the pathos of religious 
visions, shows his greed of gain and is haunted by 
dreams of monopolies and fiscal plans. We sympathize 
with the man who gave a world to Castile, and died 
with a bitter feeling that he had served princes who were 
ungrateful, and who escaped by his death one stroke of 
fate which would have been harder to bear than the 
manacles of Bobadilla. It was permitted to him to 
carry to his grave the glorious illusion " that Cuba was 
a province of the Chinese Empire, that Hispaniola was 
the island of Zipangu, and that between the Caribbean 
Sea and the Bay of Bengal there lay no water-covered 
hemisphere, but only an isthmus. The discoverer of 
America died without suspecting that he had found a 
new continent. He believed the distance between 
Jamaica and Spain to be but the third part of a circle 
of latitude, and exclaimed : " The earth is not so large 
by far as people think." The doubling of the world 
by a new continent did not lie in his thought, and his 
great deed would have seemed to him sorely diminished 
if he had been forced to admit that behind the ocean, 
over which he had triumphed, there lay yet another 
vast sea, for then his plan to bring together the western 
and the eastern civilizations would have been left but 
half accomplished." 

The earliest pictorial representation of the person 
of Columbus, of which we have any information, was 
in the gallery of Paolo Giovio, or, to give him his Latm 
name, by which he is better known, Paulus Jovius, at 



20 Have we a Portrait of Coluvtbtis ? 

Lake Como, in Italy, a wood-cut of which is in the sec- 
ond edition of a work of Jovius, entitled Elogia Virortim 
bellica virtute illustrium, or Eulogies of Men illustrious 
for their warlike prowess, published at Basel in 1576, 
and as this wood-cut is, as far as we know, the earliest 
published portrait of Columbus, it will be an appropri- 
ate introduction to this branch of our enquiry to give 
some account of Jovius and his celebrated collection. 
He was born at Como in 1483 and was consequently a 
contemporary and a countryman of Columbus, but 
probably never saw the Admiral. In 1506, when Co- 
lumbus died, Jovius, who was then in his twenty-third 
year, was a practising physician in Rome, which pro- 
fession he gave up for the pursuit of letters, and be- 
came distinguished as a writer of biographical and his- 
torical works ; and having sought advancement in the 
Church, Adrian VI. made him a canon of the Cathe- 
dral of Como. When the Constable de Bourbon sacked 
Rome, in 1527, Jovius having lost all he possessed, 
Clement VII., to reimburse him, made him Bishop of 
Nocera de' Pagani, in the Kingdom of Naples, then 
under the dominion of the Crown of Spain ; and in 1530, 
when the pope and Charles V., having been reconciled, 
had an interview at Bologna, Clement took Jovius 
with him, where it is said he was received by the em- 
peror and the princes and noblemen in his suite with 
marked distinction. He was a man of learning and of 
ability, whose productions were widely read through- 
out Europe, but a venal writer, who from large gifts 
received from those whom he praised and those who 
feared the venom of his pen, and by the sale of bene- 
fices, amassed a large fortune, with the proceeds of 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus ? 21 

which he built a villa, or rather a palatial residence, 
upon a peninsula on Lake Como, upon what he sup- 
posed to be the ruins of the villa of Pliny the Younger, 
though in this, it appears, he was mistaken, and here he 
brought together a great collection of rare and curious 
things — antiquities, pictures, statues, and other works of 
art, medals, gems, novel curiosities, both from the East 
and the West Indies, and many other objects of interest, 
which were arranged in seven stately galleries, to which 
he applied distinctive names, such as the Vestibule of 
Homer, the Hall of Pliny, the Hall of Minerva, the 
Apartment of the Sirens, the Hall of the Graces, etc. ; 
and he gave to the whole the general name of the 
" Abode of the Muses," from the Greek original of our 
modern word " Museum." 

A great central feature of this collection was a 
gallery devoted to the portraits of illustrious men, 
of which Vasari says he had upward of five hundred, 
obtained largely by gifts from sovereigns, princes, noble- 
men, and artists ; and among them was a portrait of his 
countryman Columbus. Italian writers say that he was 
constantly begging genuine portraits from kings, 
princes, noblemen and artists, and when he could not 
attain them by gift, that he employed the very best 
artists; and that he took great pains to secure those 
that were genuine. In the preface to his Elogia, 1551, 
he states that the warlike (bellicosi) heroes, whose 
eulogy he pronounces, "may be seen in his gallery set 
forth in their true likeness, in admirable portraiture." 
And in his letters published by Ticozzi and Boteri, he 
refers to the great care he took in collecting authentic 
portraits, " never feeling satisfied," he says, with those 



22 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

he received, *' fearing their incorrectness." As he was 
not only a Spanish bishop, but a man of great influence 
with Charles V., who gave him a pension, as well as 
with the eminent personages of his court, it may fairly 
be assumed that if a portrait of Columbus then existed 
in Spain, he, of all other men, was the one most likely 
to obtain it. Count Giovio says (Lari Artistici, Gio- 
vanni Giovio, Como, 1881) that it is believed that he 
got his portrait of Columbus from the navigator's son 
Diego, which, without something more authentic than 
this, may be regarded as doubtful, for Diego had been 
dead for more than ten years, when Jovius in 1537 
erected his villa at Como. 

It may well be believed that what he says of the 
great care he took to get only reliable portraits for his 
gallery was true. Some of the portraits which are 
printed in the first part of the edition of the Elogia 
of 1576, such as that of Romulus and a few others, 
were necessarily imaginative ; but it may have been 
otherwise with distinguished men of the fifteenth and 
sixteenth centuries, whose portraits, unless known to 
be genuine, would scarcely have been admitted in a 
gallery that was renowned throughout Europe, and 
that, with the collection of which it formed a part, 
was visited by people of all classes and of all countries, 
from kings and princes downwards. 

Tiraboschi says (Storia della Letteratura Italiana, 
Vol. VII., Libro III., p. 897, ed. Firenze, 1810), that 
the Museum of Jovius was one of the most memorable 
undertakinofs which the love of the fine arts and of 
letters produced in the sixteenth century. He adds : 

"The description which he himself and others after 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus f 23 

him have made of it, excites astonishment in us that a 
man in private Hfe could accomplish so much ; and he 
owed a great part of the happy success of his great idea 
to his very histories themselves ; for when it was known 
that he was writing the events of his time, many, solici- 
tous for their good name, sent him valuable gifts, hop- 
ing in this way to render the historian favorable to them." 

Its value may be judged by the circumstance that 
Giulio Romano bequeathed to it his collection of the 
paintings of Raphael It was so celebrated that Cosmo 
First, Grand Duke of Tuscany, had copies of many of 
the portraits made for his collection in Florence, which 
are now in the Ufhzi gallery. These copies were made 
by an artist named Cristofano dell' Altissimo. 

Altissimo went to Como in 1552, the year that Jovius 
died, and completed the copies by 1555.* Vasari 
gives a list of the portraits Altissimo copied. It is 
not in Bohn's English edition of Vasari, but will be 
found in the edition of Bologna, 1674 (3d vol App. 
Sign. Eff.). It contains 253 names, among which is 
" Colombo Genovese " and the portrait of Columbus, 
now in the Uffizi gallery at Florence, is supposed to 
be that copy. It appears also that another painter, 
Bernardino Campi, copied the same series at the same 
time as Altissimo for Donna Ippolita Gonzaga,f 
and if he copied the Columbus there would have 
been two copies contemporaneously made, by different 
artists, of the Jovian portrait. 

Lanzi J says that Altissimo " copied the features of 

* Vasari's Lives of the Painters, Bohn's Eng. edition, Vol. VI. 

f Notes to Vasari by S. P. Richter, Bohn's ed. of Vasari, Vol. 6,301. 

X History of Painting in Italy, Bohn's Ed. 1847, Vol. I., p. 197. 



24 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

the celebrated men, but attended little to other circum- 
stances ; whence it happens that the Giovian collection, 
the Medicean one alone, exhibits many very dissimilar 
manners, but the features of the originals are very faith- 
fully expressed," which Bryan repeats with the remark 
that these copies have a high degree of finishing with- 
out labor. ^ 

Jovius published several works in the form of eulo- 
giums upon the illustrious men in his gallery, one of 
them being devoted to Columbus, and no one who has 
written before or since has pronounced a higher eulo- 
gium upon him. What is remarkable for the period is 
the thorough knowledge he possessed of what Colum- 
bus had done ; the only error being that, as to its re- 
sults, he confounded one voyage with that of another. 
In this Elogium, as he called it, which is well written and 
eloquent, he says who does not wonder that this man, 
with a most open countenance and the amazing strength 
of a vast intellect, should have been born in a mean 
little village near Savona, and closes his eulogium with 
this passage : " So that Columbus seems to be in every 
way worthy to be honored with a most fitting statue at 
Genoa, by those Ligurians who to-day regard things 
of the present time rather than those of a former 
period;" and how truly he judged them appears in the 
fact that it took them just three hundred years to act 
upon this suggestion. 

It should, however, be stated that if what is said of 
Jovious by certain writers is correct, he is not free 
from the suspicion of being a man capable of palming 

* Bryan's Dictionary. 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus f 25 

off the portrait of another in his gallery as that of Co- 
lumbus, if it could be done without fear of detection. 

It is said that Adrian VI. made him a canon upon 
the condition that he would say something honorable 
about him in his historical works. Whether this was 
true or not, what he did say, and that not in a history, 
or a biography, but where it would scarcely be looked 
for, in a work upon Natural History, was that "he was 
without talent, ability, or mind, and, in a word, almost 
stupid."* It is also said that he frankly declared that 
he had two pens, one of gold and one of iron, and that 
he used either, as the occasion served. 

Bodin, while commending the elegance of his writ- 
ings, says that he prostituted his pen in writing history 
and got more by telling lies than other men by relat- 
ing the truth ; that when asked why he told so many, 
he replied that he did it to oblige his friends ; that he 
knew the age would not give any credit to his history, 
but that posterity would not doubt what he said. Vos- 
sius states that he promised an ancient genealogy to 
all scoundrels who paid him well, traduced others who 
would not, and had the fate of all liars, as he was not 
believed when he spoke the truth. Brantome calls him a 
great liar, Scaliger says the same, and Maresius 
speaks of him with the utmost contempt. But Bayle 
says that he can hardly believe that he confessed all 
that is related of him, as he boldly declared that he 
printed his book in the lifetime of those concerned, 
as he did not fear to be convicted of falsehood, and 
he has been defended by Oudin, Boccalini, Marcel and 

* Biographic Universelle, Paris, 1816, torn. 17, p. 434, etc. 



26 Have we a Portrait of Columbus^/ 

other writers ; the truth probably being that he was 
not as bad as he was painted. 

It is not probable, however, that he palmed off an- 
other portrait for that of Columbus. He could not 
have done so safely in a gallery so much visited, for 
there were men then living who had known Columbus, 
and Carderera says that at that highly-cultivated 
period of the sixteenth century it would not have been 
possible to put up a portrait of another in a public 
gallery as that of Columbus without detection. 

This historian, biographer, and great collector died 
in Florence in 1552, and the reader of his epitaph in 
the church of San Lorenzo, in that city, was informed, 
in a Latin couplet, that he was the glory of the Latin 
tongue, and superior either to Sallust or Livy, a judg- 
ment which posterity has not confirmed.* 

The fate of his gallery may be briefly told. When 
Clement VH. gave him a better benefice at Como than 
he had had before, he also lodged him in an apartment 
in the Vatican, which he occupied until 1549. But Paul 
IIL, Clement's successor in the papacy, having refused 
to appoint him Bishop of Como, when that see became 
vacant, he left Rome and passed the remaining three 
years of his life at his villa in Como, or in visiting dif- 
ferent courts in Italy, dying, as has been said, in Flor- 
ence in 1552 of an attack of the gout. His villa was 
broken up by the military operations in Italy toward 
the close of the sixteenth century. The villa itself was 
destroyed by the rising of the water of Lake Como, and 
when Boldoni saw it in 161 7 it was a ruin. The col- 
lection of the portraits of illustrious men, however, 

* Niceron, Memoires, etc.. Tome 25, pp. 360, 361. 



Have we a Portrait of Coluinbtts? 27 

was kept together, as a whole, until 1587, when they 
were divided between two families of Jovius' descend- 
ants, the head of one family taking the men of warlike 
prowess, and the head of the other the learned men. 

After this it underwent several subdivisions, which 
in the end resulted in the dispersion of the whole col- 
lection.* Where the portrait of Columbus went was 
not known, but in 1880 a search was made, in that part 
of the collection which had descended to Count Giovio, 
at the suggestion of Mr. J. S. Jorrin, a gentleman of 
Havana, who has for many years been engaged in in- 
vestigations relating to Columbus, and a portrait was 
found with the abbreviated inscription over it of Colum- 
buSy Lygur, Novi Orbis Reptor (Columbus, Ligurian, 
Discoverer of the New World), Liguria being the terri- 
tory in which Genoa is situated. This picture is now 
in the possession of Dr. d'Orchi, of Como, from whom 
it gets its present name, and I shall hereafter refer to it. 

I will now, with the aid of the stereopticon, show you 
the portraits, beginning with those that alone, in my 
judgment, are entitled to consideration, and which in 
the order of time, as far as we know, are the oldest ; 
and will then show you the more prominent of those 
that have been believed in, with little or nothing to sup- 
port the claim made for them. 

This is a photograph of the Jovian wood-cut from a 
copy of the edition of the Elogia of 1576 that is in my 
possession. 

Carderera says of it, what will be equally obvious 
to you upon looking at it, that the proportion and gen- 

* Lari Artistici, Giovanni Giovio. Como, 1881. Printed for private circula- 
tion. Lanzi's History of Painting in Italy. Vol. I., p. 197. Bohn ed. 



28 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus ? 



eral form of the head, the long face and the curvature 
of the nose conform to the description of Columbus 




The Jovian Columbus. 

by his contemporaries, but that beyond this all is vague 
and uncertain ; that the right eyebrow is a perfect arch, 
while the left is rather straight ; that the upper lip is 
very confused, as well as the muscles of the face, which 



Have we a Portrait of Colu77tbus? 29 

are scarcely defined, because, he remarks, the art of en- 
graving on wood did not then in such a sympathetic face 
admit of more perfect details. The wood-cut,he observes, 
is so rough and worn that it is impossible to judge with 
exactitude ; that it would not be a sufficient guide for an 
artist to reproduce the physiognomy of Columbus, 
owing to the roughness and indistinctness of the en- 
graving, and because it does not sufficiently define 
some important features. He and Senor Angel de los 
Rios, a distinguished member of the Madrid Academy, 
and an eminent literary man in Spain, agree that this 
wood-cut must be the standard in this enquiry, as it is the 
most ancient testimony that a portrait of Columbus had 
been painted, and because he is represented in the frock 
of a Franciscan monk, which was the kind of dress 
worn by Columbus when the curate Bernaldez saw him 
in Castile, upon his return from his second voyage. 
Senor de los Rios, moreover, has shown that this was 
the kind of dress then worn by sailors in Spain as a pro- 
tection against the weather, and which, he says, is still 
worn by Spanish sailors and by farmers in the Basque 
provinces.* Carderera compared this wood-cut with a 
sketch of the picture in the Uffizi gallery, which he 
had made for him by a distinguished artist in Florence 
and he was satisfied of the identity of the two heads. 

I will now show the picture in the Uffizi from a 
photograph of it. 

You will see that it agrees with the wood-cut in the 
manner in which the hair is worn, in the shape of the 
forehead, in the high-arched eye-brows and the fixed 

*Boletin de la Real Academia de la Historia, Tomo I., Cuaderno III. 
Feb. 187Q. 



30 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

look out of the eye, so far as these features are indi- 
cated in the wood-cut ; in the aquiline nose and the 
long face, which looks, however, fuller. I have seen 
this portrait twice during the past forty years, and if I 
may rely on my recollection, it represents a man of 




The Altissimo Portrait. 

forty or a little over, with dark hair. We do not posi- 
tively know the year of Columbus's birth, and his age 
at any particular period has, therefore, been a matter 
of conjecture ; though as appears from a document re- 
cently discovered at Genoa it may be fixed within a 
range of five years. In respect to his hair, his son Fer- 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus f 3 1 

dinand says that it turned white when he was thirty, 
whilst Oviedo, who saw him at Barcelona after his re- 
turn from his first voyage, says that his hair was red, 
and he was then, according to the recently-discovered 
document, at least forty years of age, so that upon these 
two points there is the same uncertainty as in other 
matters respecting him. In pointing out that the face 
is more round and full in this picture than in the Jovian 
wood-cut, and that the hair is neither red, nor gray, but 
dark, you will remember what I quoted from Lanzi, 
that whilst Altissimo copied the features, he attended 
/zV//^ to ^M^r circumstances, and I have read in another 
writer, whose name I cannot recall, that in making these 
copies he painted them so as to conform to the then 
prevailing taste of the Renaissance, and in doing so he 
may have taken many liberties. 

In the general effect the two pictures do not look 
alike, in respect to which I may quote the remark of 
Carderera, that variations born of the school and man- 
nerism of each artist are no obstacle to a good resem- 
blance ; of which I will now show you a striking illustra- 
tion in two copies of this very portrait in the Uffizi 
Gallery. 

When Thomas Jefferson was minister to France in 
1784 he was desirous of obtaining a copy of a portrait 
of Columbus to bring to this country, and being told 
by the best-informed persons that the one in the Uffizi 
was considered a genuine portrait, he had a copy made 
of it, which is now in the possession of the Massachu- 
setts Historical Society ; and when Gouverneur Morris 
afterwards went as minister to France he also had a 
copy made of the one in the Uffizi, which after his death 



32 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

his widow presented to the New York Historical 
Society where it now is. I will show you these 
copies together, and without a careful examination you 
would scarcely suppose that both are copies from the 
same picture. 

You will observe that this picture in the Uffizi has 
not the Franciscan garment that is in the wood cut. It 
may be that the copyist, Altissimo, thought it unfit in 
the portrait of a distinguished man, or it may be that 
the engraver of the wood-cut, who, it appears, like Altis- 
simo, was not a faithful copyist, may have heard, for 
the fact was then known, that Columbus had worn such 
a habit, and thought it appropriate in the wood-cut to 
clothe him in what was in his times the dress alike of 
a sailor and of an ecclesiastic. 

The wood-cuts in the Elogia of 1576 were engraved 
by Thomas Stimmer. Ginguene, a French writer, in 
an article in the Biographie Universelle in 18 16, says 
that the portraits engraved in this book " were not 
copied with fidelity from those that ornamented the 
gallery of Jovius." He does not say upon what this 
statement was founded ; but a century ago, he may 
possibly have seen portraits that were known to have 
been in the Jovian gallery. He was a very learned man 
and the author, among other works, of a voluminous 
history of Italian Literature. He was noted for his 
high integrity and his accuracy, and it may be fairly 
assumed that a scholar of this nature would not have 
made such a positive statement as this, unless he had 
found evidence to warrant it.* 

' Thomas Stimmer was a Swiss who, between the years 1570 and 1590, prac- 
tised his art in Basel and at Strasburg. The art of wood engraving at that 





< 

H 

o 

0. 



CO -^ 

s I 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 33 

Some years ago I met with a photograph of Colum- 
bus which greatly impressed me. I then knew noth- 
ing of the source from which it was derived; but in 
going over the Naval Museum of Madrid in 1881 I 
saw the picture from which it was taken. I made in- 
quiries respecting this portrait, and a few days after- 



period, the last quarter of the sixteenth century, was iu a low state (Linton's 
Masters of Wood Engraving, p. 120), and Stimmer was among the best of those 
that followed it. He was, what was unusual at the time, a designer, as well as an 
engraver and was employed for some years by Peter Perna, the publisher at Basel, 
in illustrating popular works. Papillon says that he had taste and a marvellous 
facility in composition (Traite de la Gravure en Bois, tom. I., pp. 258, 259), quali- 
ties which would not necessarily warrant the assurance that he was a faithful 
copyist of 130 portraits of the Joi^ian gallery, but the kind of artist who might be 
tempted to take liberties. Ginguene is not the only writer that refers to the want 
of fidelity in these wood-cuts. Niceron, in his history of illustrious literary men 
( Memoires pour servir a I'histoire des hommes illustresdans la republique des lettres, 
Paris, 43 Vols., 1724-1741, 847, H. L.), goes even farther than Ginguene, for after 
stating that this Elogia of J jvius is one of the most interesting and useful of his 
works, says that it is sometimes found with portraits which are for the most part 
fanciful. Peter Perna in his edition of this Elogia, in 1575, states upon the title 
page that it is " now adorned with portraits, expressed to the life'' from Jovius' 
gallery, and in his preface to another work of Jovius, Elogia Virorum Literis 
lUustrium, published by Perna two years afterwards, which has likewise wood- 
cuts of the personages whose eulogiums are given, he says that the wood-cuts 
with which it is illustrated are " set forth with the greatest fidelity to the pro- 
totypes newly brought forth from that suburban Como, at no less expense than 
they were taken to it"; which may be nothing more than a publisher's advertisement. 
Mr. Harrisse, in a recent publication (Christopher Columbus and the Bank 
of St. George, New York, 1888), says that the oldest effigy of Columbu*: is a 
rough wood-cut in Jovius' " Illustrium Virorum Vitse " printed in Florence in 1549. 
I have not seen the edition of the Vitcs, as it is called, of that year, but the edi- 
tion of the work two years afterwards by the same publisher, the Duke's printer, 
L. Torrentini, contains no eulogy on Columbus, nor any wood-cuts. In the same 
year, in the same city, the same printer published, the Jovian Elogia Virorum 
Bellica Virtute Illustrium (Men illustrious for their warlike prowess) which 
contains the eulogy on Columbus, but has no wood-cuts, nor engraving of any 
kind, except the publisher's imprint on the title page. Jovius was the author of 
at least four different works which were either biographies or what he called 
eulogies upon the illustrious persons in his gallery. I. Elogia Virorum Illus- 
trium, Venice, 1546; 2. Illustrium Virorum Vitse, Florence, 1549, 1551, Basel, 



34 Have we a Portrait of Cohimbus f 

wards the head of the Museum politely addressed me a 
note, to the effect that neither he nor his predecessor had 
ever been able to learn anything respecting its history, 
I have since learned, from what is said of it by Car- 
derera and from other sources, that the Minister of Ma- 
rine, many years ago, ordered a portrait to be painted 



1577; 3- Elogia Virorum Bellica Virtute lUustrium, Florence, i£5i; Basel, 1575 ; 
4. Elogia Virorum Literis Illustrium, Basel, 1577, and there are other titles: 
Elogia veris clarorum virorum imaginibus apposita quae in Musaeo loviano Comi 
spectantur . . . addita Adrian! Pont. Vita, Venitiis, 1546, fol.; and Elogia Doctorum 
Virorum ab avorum memona publicatis ingenii monumentis illustrium, Venice, 
1546 ; Antwerp, 1557; Basil, 1571, in respect to all of which there is some con- 
fusion among biographers and authors, as Jovius made additions and changes 
in these works, an elogiurn that had appeared in an earlier work being some- 
times transferred to a later one as more appropriate, so that these different works 
are sometimes confounded with each other. 

If the edition of the work known as the Vitae (Illustrium Virorum Vitae, 
Florence, 1549) contained this woodcut of Columbus, as Mr. Harrisse states, it 
is noticeable that no eulogy upon Columbus nor wood cut of him is in the second 
edition of that work printed by the same publisher in the same place two years 
afterwards, and that the Elogia Virorum Bellica, etc., printed by him the same 
year, 1551, has the eulogy on Columbus, but no cut of him; which I state, having 
examined both editions. 

So far as I have been able to ascertain, the wood-cuts, of which that of Colum- 
bus was one, first appeared in Peter Perna's edition of the Elogia Virorum Bellica, 
etc., in 1575, the title page of which indicates, by the words "and tiow 
adorned with portraits," etc., that the work was then, for the first time, illustrated 
by these wood-cuts. In a subsequent edition of the work some years afterwards, 
Perna, in a preface in which he dedicates this edition to Francis de' Medici, 
after mentioning that the work was " formerly dedicated to Cosmus, that great 
prince, by the greatest historian of our age," commends the edition to Francis, 
"as now illustrated by true images from the life, gathered, increased and or- 
namented with great care, equal art and no less expense," which I interpret as 
meaning that it was he, Perna, who had illustrated the work by these wood-cuts. 
There is another circumstance which confirms my impression that they first 
appeared in this edition of Basel of 1575. The engraver Stimmer surrounded 
each of the portraits with an elaborate border or frame, embracing figures and 
other ornamental designs. In the copy that I have of this edition, which con- 
tains 130 wood-cuts, ten frames are printed with the space for the portraits left 
blank, indicating that when this copy went to the press, the figures to fill these 
blank spaces had not then been engraved. 



n 



Have zue a Portrait of Columbus f 



35 



of Columbus for his department, and that the artist em- 
ployed painted it from an engraving of Columbus by 
Capriolo, an Italian engraver, in a work called Ritratti 
di Cento Capitanz Ilhcstri {j^ovtvdAis of a hundred illus- 
trious captains), which Capriolo published in Rome in 




Columbus. 
{Marine Museum, Madrid^ 

1596, twenty years after the publication of the Jovian 
wood-cut, and which, judging from the descriptions of 
Columbus' personal appearance that have come down 
to us and what we may accept as to his character, is to 
my mind the most satisfactory representation of him 
which exists. It greatly impressed Carderera, who 
thinks it was engraved from another portrait than the 



36 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus ? 



one in the Jovian Gallery, which was painted from the 
life, after the great discoverer's final return from his 
fourth voyage, when he was sad and down-hearted, 
through the ingratitude of the king and his courtiers, 
but had an admirer in an artist who would have found 




CHRISTOPHORO COLOMBO 



The Capriolo Engraving. 



a pleasure in making a portrait of so great a man, 
either in painting or sketching him. 

The learned Baron Vernazza has said that it is not 
known that there was before 1506, the year in which 
Columbus died, any painter or sculptor living in Spain, 
except Antonio del Rincon, the court painter of Ferdi- 
nand and Isabella. It is an unsafe thing for any writer 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus ? 37 

to make such a positive statement as this, for I find 
that there were in Spain, during Columbus' time, fifteen 
painters, all men of ability,* that several of them were 
portrait-painters, and that between 1492 and 1506 there 
were three painters in Seville, where Columbus lived 
during most of the time that he was in Spain, Juan 
Sanchez de Castro, Juan Nunez, his pupil, and Gon- 
zalo Diaz. 

It is true that the painting of portraits of individuals 
was not then as general in Spain as in Italy or the 
Netherlands. Painters there were mostly employed in 
executing works for churches, or convents, or otherwise 
decorating religious edifices. They painted religious 
subjects such as saints, apostles, or scenes from the 
Saviour's life, generally representing single figures or 
groups of persons, of whom there being no portraits, 
they were painted from living models; so that these 
artists may be said to have been constantly employed 
in the art of portraiture, and any one of them could 
have painted a good portrait. 

The more I have examined the Capriolo engraving, 
the more I have been convinced that we have in it the 
true likeness of Columbus at a late period of his life 
and such as no artist of that period would be likely to 
have created. The face is somewhat broader than in 
the portraits previously referred to ; but this is a pecu- 
liarity of Capriolo's engravings. In all other respects 
Carderera and De los Rios recognized that the features 



* Juan Sanchez de Castro, Pedro Sanchez, Juan Nunez, Gonzalo Diaz, 
Nicolas Francisco Pisan, Jorge Ingles, Frutos Flores, Juan Flamenco, Fran- 
cisco de Amberes, Juan de Flandes, Juan de Borgona, Antonio del Rincon, Alvar 
Perez de Velloldos, Garcia del Barcia, Juan Rodriguez, and some others. 



38 Have we a Portrait of Columbus ? 

are the same as the one in the Uffizi. The stereopti- 
con view of it that I have shown is from a copy of the 
work in my possession, now a rare book, which, after 
a search of many years, I succeeded in obtaining. 

The argument of de Conches that if there had been 
a portrait to refer to, Oviedo, Fernando, and after 
them Benzoni and Herrera, would not have given such 
details of Columbus' personal appearance, is not con- 
clusive. The utmost that can be inferred from this is 
that they probably did not know of any portrait. It 
does not prove that one had never been painted. 
Oviedo saw him upon his return from his first voyage. 
Las Casas knew him only in the latter part of his life, 
and Ferdinand was a youth of eighteen when his father 
died, and it does not follow if a likeness of him had 
been taken, that Oviedo, Fernando, or Benzoni and 
Herrera, or any one of them, would necessarily have 
known it. 

In the engraving, Columbus is dressed in a close-fit- 
ting habit, as in the Uffizi picture, over which a mantle 
is classically draped. This the artist employed by the 
Minister of Marine did not follow ; but substituted for 
it the dress in the Yanez picture, to be hereafter referred 
to, as that picture was in 1763, and painting the por- 
trait in colors he gave the eyes, the hair, and the com- 
plexion as described by Columbus' contemporaries. It 
appears to have been removed from the Department 
of Marine to where it now is in the Naval Museum. I 
had a copy of it made while I was in Madrid for our 
Society, and it may be seen in our principal room. A 
recent German writer, who it would seem was not aware 
of the engraving of 1596, frorn which it was taken, thinks 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 



39 



that it, and the recently discovered portrait under the 
Yaiiez, are, when we carefully examine the description 
of Columbus by his contemporaries, the most like him.* 
Domenico Colombo, lord of the castle of Cuccaro, in 
Piedmont, claimed to be a relative of Columbus and a 
representative of that family who brought a suit be- 
fore the Council of the Indies to inherit, when the male 




The Cancellieri Engraving. 



line of Columbus became extinct, and set forth, among 
other things, that his family had in their possession a 
genuine portrait of Columbus, which Harrisse thinks 
is entitled to consideration. 

A fine engraving of this picture was published by 
Napione in 1808, in his work on the birthplace of Co- 
lumbus, and another was published by Cancellieri, the 
writer of a work on the navigator, from which this por- 
trait gets its name. Carderera, whilst recognizing its 

*'Allgemeine Geschichte von Wilhelm Oncken, Berlin, 1882, pp. 232 to 240. 



40 Have zve a Portrait of Columbus ? 

general resemblance to the preceding portraits, points 
out a slight variation in the hair and in the e5'ebrows. 

A few miles north of Genoa, close to the sea, on the 
Corniche road, is Cogoleto, which for more than a cen- 
tury enjoyed the distinction of being the birthplace of 
Columbus. It is a small village of a single street, 
upon one of the houses of which one Antonio Colombo 
in 1650 placed an inscription to the effect that Colum- 
bus was born in that house. I was at CoQfoleto in 1881, 
and making some general inquiry of the person who oc- 
cupied the house respecting Columbus, he took me to 
another house in the same street, and ascending^ to the 
second story brought me into a room where the village 
archives were kept. A venerable old gentleman, the 
apparent custodian of the archives, was seated at a 
table, and, when informed that I was making enquiries 
respecting Columbus, he turned in his chair and draw- 
ing back a green curtain exhibited what is known as the 
Cogoleto portrait. Isnardi, who wrote a book on 
the birthplace of Columbus, states that the history 
of this picture has been traced for more than three 
hundred years, a statement with which the picture 
certainly, at least in its appearance, agrees, for it is 
old and very much worn. The late Admiral Bald- 
win, who was then a member of our Council and at the 
time in command of the United States squadron in the 
Mediterranean, had, at my request, a photograph taken 
of it, of the size of the original, for our Society, which 
now hangs upon our walls. The portrait appears to 
me to have been the work of a not over-skilful artist.* 

*The photographic copy of the Cogoleto picture in the Society's possession was 
found to be too indistinct to reproduce in a satisfactory wood cut. 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus ? 



41 



It has a hard, somewhat heavy and solemn look, but 
has the same features as the previous portraits, with the 
same depression in the chin that is seen in the Altissimo, 
the Capriolo and in the other earlier portraits, but much 
more marked. It has the same dress as in the Altissimo, 



. , ^"^'^''-^ ^f^-"*^. 





The Belvedere Columbus. 

and it will be noticed that the mouth " is a little large," 
as mentioned in the description of Benzoni. It has the 
inscription above the head : Christophorus Coltimbus 
Novi Orbis Reptor (Christopher Columbus, Discoverer 
of the New World). 

Among those who had copies made in the sixteenth 
century from the Jovian gallery was Ferdinand, Arch- 



42 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

duke of Austria, who, in 1579, sent artists to Como to 
have copies of these celebrated portraits for his castle 
in Innsbruck, and the portrait of Columbus now in the 
Belvedere at Vienna is supposed to be one of these 
copies. This is from an engraving of it in my posses- 
sion, and its resemblance, in its general features, to the 
portrait in the Uffizi gallery at Florence, by Altissimo, 
will be recognized. 

This is from a book of engravings by Crispin de Pass, 
published in 1598, twenty-two years after the Jovian 
wood-cut and two years after the Capriolo engraving. It 
has the long face, the aquiline nose, the high-arched eye- 
brows, and the same dress as the wood-cut, with a gold 
chain, as Columbus was known to have worn one, and 
with a nautical instrument in his hand. Carderera points 
out that the shape of the nose has been altered by the 
engraver, and he appears to have made a few other un- 
important changes.* 

In 1763 a Mr. Yanez brought from Granada to Ma- 
drid four portraits, all of the same size and general ap- 
pearance, which were purchased by the Spanish Gov- 
ernment ; one of which was a portrait of Columbus. It 
had a light cloak crossing the breast, and in the dress 
and features was different from any portrait previously 
known. About twelve years ago it was subjected to a 
critical examination, when it appeared to have been re- 
touched, and upon rubbing the paint in one corner the 
letter C was found, which led to a removal of the outer 
covering, when a much finer portrait was discovered 
beneath, corresponding in all respects with the descrip- 

* The description given in the text is thought to be sufficient without a wood 
cut. 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus ? 



43 



tion 'of Columbus by his contemporaries, and having 
the inscription on the top : Columbus Lygir Novi 
Orbis Reptor (Columbus, Ligurian, Discoverer of the 
New World). 




The YaNez Portrait. 

Experts recognize from the canvas and other indica- 
tions that it was painted in Italy about the middle of 
the sixteenth century, and was probably brought to 
Spain about that period, when a love of pictures and 
of all objects of art was awakened in the Spanish noble- 
men who returned from Italy. I saw this recovered 
portrait in Madrid in 1881, and Gen. Fairchild, who 



44 Have we a Portrait of Colujnbusf 

was then our minister in Spain, had a copy of it made, 
which is now in the Wisconsin Historical Society, and 
is the one from which the photograph shown was 
taken. 

This is the portrait in the Royal Library at Madrid, 




The RiNCON Portrait. 

which has been attributed to Antonio del Rincon. It is 
not found in the catalogue of his works that have come 
down to us, and nothing is known of its history beyond 
the fact that it was in existence in the early part of the 
seventeenth century. It is a very fine portrait, full of 
life and expression, and may well have been the work 
of the master to whom it is attributed. It represents a 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 



45 



younger man than the one in the Uffizi. and its corre- 
spondence with the features in that portrait will be read- 
ily recognized. 

This is the d'Orchi portrait to which I have re- 
ferred, and the last of those which I think entitled to 




The D'Orchi Portrait. 

consideration. Mr. Jorrin,of Havana, the gentleman at 
whose request, as I have said, the search was made that 
resulted in finding it, says that it was too old and worn 
to^have a satisfactory photograph made from it, and that 
Count Giovio had a copy of it, in water colors, carefully 
made by a French artist, from which the photograph 
now shown may have been made, which I have taken 
from a French illustrated paper. 



46 Have zve a Portrait of Columbus f 

Mr. Jorrin gave, in 1887 in a newspaper in Havana, 
a very full account of his relations with Count Giovio 
in the finding of this picture. He thinks it has been 
repaired and retouched, a long time ago. It has the 
long visage, the large arched eyebrows, the kind of 
forehead, the aquiline nose, the depression in the chin 
and the same distribution of the hair and the same 
dress as in the Uffizi picture, and from the cir- 
cumstances under which it was found, it may possibly be 
the portrait that was in the Jovian gallery. It is a strong 
and satisfactory picture, and looks like one that may 
have been painted from life. 

My address has extended to such length as not to 
admit of any thing beyond some general observations 
upon these nine portraits, which embrace the earliest 
known. I can only say that they all, to me, represent 
the same man. You have seen them, however, and can 
form your own judgment. They differ from each other 
in the expression and in their general effect, and so do 
the original portraits of Washington by Peale, Sharp- 
less, Robertson, Stuart and others. It is certainly re- 
markable that they all have the same features, or char- 
acteristics, the peculiar curved depression in the chin, 
which no artist is likely to have invented ; the large ex- 
pansive bony orbit of the eyes, the aquiline nose, the rec- 
ognizable length of the visage and the ample chest, de- 
noting the "well formed man" of " robust limbs " as 
Columbus is stated to have been by Oviedo and his son 
Ferdinand, which convince me that one or more of 
them are actual portraits, or that they all have been 
painted from a common type. The Rincon is that of 
a younger looking man than the d'Orchi, while the 



Have we a Portrait of Cotumbiis f 47 

d'Orchi is a face not as old as the one in the Capriolo 
engraving. The face of a person differs at different per- 
iods of life, and the change is often so great that the 
man at one stage of life differs -very much from the 
same man at another. If the Spanish experts are right 
in their supposition that the recovered Yanez, as well 
as the three pictures that were purchased with it by the 
Spanish Government in i 763, were, from the indications 
upon which they rely, all painted about the middle of the 
sixteenth century,then the Yanez may have been painted 
from the one that was in the Jovian gallery, which was 
then in existence, and that there was a portrait of Colum- 
bus there, I think after what has been stated, admits of 
no doubt. I regard the Capriolo engraving, the Yanez, 
and the d'Orchi as the most satisfactory. I think we 
have in them the true features and general appearance 
of Columbus ; the d'Orchi at an earlier, and the Cap- 
riolo at a later period. Carderera considered the Cap- 
riolo engraving the most valuable of all the representa- 
tions of Columbus with which he was acquainted when 
he wrote his article on Don Angel de los Rios' report in 
1879,* ^"d so far as my information has extended, that 
appears to be generally the opinion of artists and those 
most competent to judge. 

I will now show you the more prominent of the pic- 
tures that have been supposed to be portraits of 
Columbus. 

This is from an engraving in a work published by 
Thevet in 1586, who says he engraved it from a por- 
trait that he found in Lisbon. It is not probable that 
Columbus had his portrait painted at the early period 

• Boletin dela Real Academia de la Historia, Tomo I., Cuaderno III., p. 258. 



48 



Have we a Po7' trait of Columbus? 



that he was in that city, and this represents a much older 
man than he was when in Portugal. It has a great pro- 
fusion of curly hair, a very large hawk-like nose, with a 
heavy moustache and large beard covering up the lower 
part of the face and leaving little to distinguish the 
general features, and contour of the face. 




The Thevet Portrait, 

Theodore De Bry published for some years and in 
several languages a serial known as his Collection of 
Voyages. It has many imaginary things, and is a work 
of little value except to collectors, from its curious en- 
gravings and the difficulty of obtaining complete sets of 
it. The fourth part of this collection, which was pub- 
lished in 1594, has an engraved medallion head of Co- 
lumbus. It is ver)^ small, about three-quarters of an 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus f 49 

inch in diameter, and in the form of the head, the curve 
of the eyebrows, the aquiline nose, and, so far as it can 
be discerned, what appears to have been intended for 
a depression in the chin, it may be said to have some 
resemblance to the early portraits, but in other particu- 
lars it is unlike. The fifth part of this collection, pub- 
lished the following year, 1595, contains another and a 
very different engraved portrait of Columbus, which is 
the one here shown, and is now known and referred to 
as the De Bry. In the text of the work he gives this 
account of it : ''Since Columbus," he says, "was a man 
of sagacity, of great intellect and courage, the King and 
the Queen of Castile, before he departed from them, 
ordered that his likeness should be taken to the life by 
some most excellent painter, so that if he did not re- 
turn from that expedition, they might have some me- 
morial of him, and I found to my great delight a copy 
of this portrait recently, after finishing the former 
fourth book, with a certain friend of mine, who had re- 
ceived it from the painter himself. I wished you also 
to have part in this, and to that end have had the like- 
ness cut in copper by my son, in a small form, as per- 
fectl}^ as it could be done, and now show and present it 
to you." And then says, "and in truth the virtue of 
the man is altogether such as to deserve that his like- 
ness should be laid before the eyes of all good men, for 
he was an upright man, courteous, magnanimous, and 
of good morals ; a very firm lover of peace and justice.'^ 
From the position of these words in the text, '' ab ipso 
pictore"" (from the painter himself), an ordinary reader 
would suppose that De Bry's friend received the copy 
from the painter to whom Columbus sat for the por- 



50 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

trait, and this I think De Bry meant the reader should 
infer, as it would enhance the value of a book embel- 
lished by the engraving of a man whose virtue, he in- 
forms the reader, "was such as to deserve that his like- 
ness should be laid before the eyes of all good men." 
If this was what he meant, that the copy was obtained 
by his friend from the artist who painted the original, 
the fact was scarcely possible, unless the artist had 
reached an extraordinary age, for in the year in which 
De Bry says he received this picture, 1595, Columbus 
had been dead for ninety years. 

Spotorno refers to another statement of De Bry re- 
lating either to this or to the medallion head of the 
previous year, which Spotorno gives as one of his 
reasons for impugning the authenticity of the De Bry 
portrait. "Theodore De Bry," he says, ''pretended 
that he possessed a portrait of the hero, the same that 
was to be seen in an apartment of the Council of the 
Indies, from which place, having been stolen and carried 
to the Netherlands for sale, it came finally into the 
hands of De Bry, who gave an engraving of it in his 
America."* There is no evidence that there ever was 
any portrait of Columbus in any apartment of the Coun- 
cil of the Indies, and moreover an exhaustive search 
was made in inventories and other records of the royal 
establishments of the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, 
and down to and including that of Philip II., for any 
evidence that a portrait of Columbus had been in the 
possession of either of these sovereigns, and none could 
be found. 

No reliance, I think, can be placed on the statement of 

* Memorials of Columbus, p. cxvii., London, 1823. 



Have we a Portrait of Cohtmbus f 



51 



De Bry. Navarrete distrusted it (Memorias, vol. 
viii., p. 18; Boletin I., 3, 245). Professor I. D. But- 
ler, in his Monograph on the Portraits, calls it " a 
Dutch imposture," and that the whole account was fab- 
ricated may fairly be assumed from the fact that the per- 




The De Bry Engraving 

sonage represented in the engraving in no way conforms 
to the description of Columbus by his contemporaries, 
and is wholly different from any of the portraits that are 
known to have been in existence before it. 

There is nothing in it indicating the intelligence, 
acuteness and ideality we should expect to find in a 
portrait of Columbus. It is a heavy, stolid head with 
elaborate curls under a barret cap, and has three prom- 



52 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

inent warts upon the face. If Columbus had three such 
deformities upon his face as these, his contemporaries 
who have described his features with so much exact- 
ness would, I think, have mentioned it. 

The head in this engraving is shrouded in the large 
hooded cap formed from the chaperon, which came into 
use in the middle of the 15th century (Lacroix, Manners 
and Customs of the Middle Ages, p. 533; Planche, Cyclo- 
pedia of Costume, vol. i., pp. 294, 295), and the hooded 
cap and robes strike me as being Italian or German, 
rather than Spanish of the 15th century — the usual 
covering for the head of men in Spain at that period, 
as far as we can judge from the paintings and draw- 
ings that have come down to us, being the high conical 
cap and the sombrero. 

Some years ago a portrait was discovered, known 
now as the Versailles portrait, which is claimed to be 
the one from which the De Bry engraving of 1595 was 
made, and, therefore, as supporting De Bry's statement. 
If this were true, however, it would only prove that fact, 
and would not verify the other part of the story. I 
have not seen this Versailles portrait, but when com- 
paring the Darmstadt engraving of it with the one in 
De Bry, I am satisfied that instead of its being the one 
from which the De Bry was engraved, that it was 
painted from the De Bry. During the three centuries 
that have elapsed since De Bry's book was published 
there have been many reproductions of the De Bry, 
chiefly engravings. I have many of these engravings 
in my possession, and in most of them the engraver, 
or draughtsman, has undertaken to improve upon the 
De Bry by making it more artistic and effective. To 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 53 

do[this many liberties have been taken and material alter- 
ations have been made. This is the case with the Ver- 
sailles portrait. It has evidently been painted from the 
De Bry engraving by some artist during the three cen- 
turies that have intervened, who, whilst preserving 
the resemblance, has undertaken, and succeeded, by 
making material changes, in producing a much more 
artistic and finer work of art. It differs from the en- 
graving in these particulars. The representation of 
the hair is not the same, the elaborate curls of the en- 
graving being discarded. The position of the face is 
changed so as to give it a different expression, and the 
mouth is altered. Instead of the corrugfated face and 
deep wrinkles of the engraving, the face is smoother 
and broader, the three prominent warts are not on it, 
and the figure is clothed differently. If De Bry's son 
had engraved from the painting, it may be assumed 
that he would not have put three warts upon the face, 
which were a deformity, when there were none in the 
picture, and this, with the other material differences, 
convinces me that the painting was made from 
the engraving and not the engraving from the paint- 
ing. 

I have been thus particular in respect to the DeBry 
because this representation of Cojumbus, which has 
nothing to support it but De Bry's statement, has been 
more multiplied and has had more prominence than 
any other. It has been inserted in several works as 
his true portrait. There is an exquisite engraving of 
it, by Raimondi or some other Italian artist, and the 
recognition of it still continues. At the late Centennial 
celebration in this city it was the chief decoration of 



54 Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 

the City Hall, and the one that adorned the front of 
the Herald office. 

This portrait is by Parmigiano. I show it, because so 
distinguished a writer as Prescott has given it in his 
History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella as 
the portrait of Columbus. I have seen it in Naples. It 
is a very fine picture, and evidently the work of that 
eminent master. It is sufficient to say that Parmigiano 
was three years of age when Columbus died, and if he 
intended it as a portrait of Columbus it was a work of 
imagination. It has a large moustache and long beard, 
neither of which was worn in Spain until long after the 
death of Columbus. It is probably the portrait of some 
distinguished Italian nobleman. 

This is by Antonio Moro, a celebrated painter,, 
a native of the Netherlands, who went to Spain in 
1552 and was largely patronized by Philip II. The 
picture, which is an admirable work of art, is said to 
have been in one of the vessels of the Armada that was 
wrecked off the coast of Great Britain, and to have 
come into the possession of an English family. It has 
a moustache and ruff, neither of which was worn in 
Spain in the time of Columbus. It is now in the pos- 
session of Mr. Gunther of Chicago, who is said to have 
paid a large sum of money for it. 

This is the one published by Munoz in his work in 
1793. It has, like the previous portrait, a large ruff, 
and has nothing to support it, except the reputation it 
acquired by being printed in Muiioz's work. 

This is the one found by M. Jomard, an eminent 
member of the French Academy, about fifty years ago^ 
in a gallery at Vicenza in Italy, with the name of 



Have zve a Por^ trait of ColiLmbus f 55 

Columbus upon it, and all that he could learn was that 
it had been bequeathed to that city by a family residing^ 
there. That it has a peaked beard, a large moustache 
and a full ruff is sufficient to show that it represents a 
person who lived a century after Columbus. The 
eminence of M. Jomard as a scholar and his be- 
lief in it gave it for some years considerable promi- 
nence. 

Mr. Harrisse states that there is a portrait in the Ar- 
senal of Cartagena in Spain of Columbus, for which he is 
said to have sat. In 1852 the committee, of which Car- 
derera vv^as chairman, being authorized by the Spanish 
Government to prosecute their investigation in all parts 
of Spain, and all Spanish officials being required to afford 
them every facility, caused enquiries to be made, 
among other places, in the Arsenal of Cartagena, and 
were officially advised that there was no portrait of 
Columbus there. As this was more than forty years 
ago, I thought I would have an enquiry made this year, 
and accordingly wrote to a friend in Spain, who had 
a correspondent in Cartagena, to whom he wrote, and 
who replied that the general in charge of the arsenal 
having been but recently appointed, he applied to his 
secretary, who had been in the office for years, and also 
to the general in charge of the Department of Con- 
struction, who had been in the arsenal as long as my 
friend's correspondent could remember, and to several 
other officers employed in it, and none of them had 
ever seen, or heard of any portrait of Columbus there ; 
the correspondent adding that the only thing in the ar- 
senal relating to Columbus was a marble statue of 



LofC. 



56 Have we a Portrait of Columbus f 

him, made in Naples in 1876, and which had recently 
been presented by the government to the town.'^ 

I will now call your attention to the Albany portrait, 
because it has for many years had a prominent place 
in the Senate chamber of this State, and has been 
claimed to be authentic, with nothing whatever to sup- 
port the claim. It was presented to the State by Mrs. 
Maria Farmer in 1784, after failing to sell it, as appears 
by an advertisement of the period in Rivingtoii' s Ga- 
zette, In her communication to the State she said 
that it was a copy of an original painting of 1592, 
which had been in the possession of her family for 
150 years. It in no way resembles the description 
of Columbus by his contemporaries or the earlier 
portraits. Wm. Henry Bogert, the- Clerk of the Senate 
in 1850, made an official report to the Senate upon it, 
in which he said : " The facts of a curious and event- 
ful history cluster around this portrait. Its lineage is 
far better supported than that of most pictures present- 
ing like claims, and every research made in respect to 
it has only confirmed its authenticity." It is extraordi- 
nary how men will write like this where they know noth- 
ing; and my old friend Mr. Bogert, who is not now 
living, would have been greatly mortified if I had told 
him what I thought of his statement. 

I might refer to some other portraits, such as the 
Juan de la Cosa, the Montanus of 1671, the Berwick- 
Alba, the Malpica, the Cladera, the Venetian Mosaic, 



* I have since received communications in writing made by the Secretary of 
the Governor in charge, and of the General in charge of the Department of Con- 
struction, stating that there is no portrait of Columbus in the Arsenal, and that 
they never heard that any portrait of him had been there. 



Have we a Portrait of Coluinbus ? 57 

the portrait presented by the Duke of Veragua, the de- 
scendant of Columbus, to the city of Havana ; the Hone 
portrait, engraved for Edwards's Work on the West In- 
dies, the Flameng etching, reproduced in the work of 
Belloy, the Giulio Romano in Genoa, the Hermitage in 
St. Petersburg, the Hull portrait in Connecticut and the 
two portraits, one a miniature said to have been given 
to an official in Washington by Sophia Matilda, 
Queen of Holland, and a larger one on panel, with a 
carefully painted ruff, which are in the possession of 
the Hon. Wm. A. Bryan, of Morristown, N. J., and some 
others ; but I shall pass them by, and refer only to the 
last one that has been brought to public attention, that 
known as the Lotto portrait, now owned by Mr. Ells- 
worth of Chicago, which has the signature of Lorenzo 
Lotto, an eminent painter of the Venetian school. Mr. 
Harrisse has denied eight of the statements put forth in 
an account of the history of this picture, and has shown 
that the map which the person represented holds in his 
hand is the one made by Johannes Ruysch, which first 
appeared in the Ptolemy, printed at Rome in 1508, the 
earliest engraved map of America that is known ; '* and 
as we are told," Mr. Harrisse says, " that this picture 
bears the date of 1502," which would be six years before 
this map was published, he pronounces the picture a 
fabrication. 

Mr. John C. Van Dyke, however, in an article in the 
Cosmopolitan Magazine of last October, gives the date 
of the picture as 1 5 1 2, " though," he says, " the date has 
been hastily scrumbled over with gray paint." So that 
whether Mr. Harrisse has been misinformed as to the 
date, or the date has been altered to 15 12, is a matter 



58 



Have we a Portrait of Cohimbus f 



to be determined only by an expert. Under these cir- 
cumstances the picture is not free from suspicion, for it 




The Lotto Portrait. 



has not been unusual for pictures to be fabricated and 
sold as works of eminent masters that have deceived, 
accomplished experts. 



Have we a Porti'ait of Coiutnbus? 59 

Mr. Van Dyke's paper is one that has been carefully 
considered by a writer well informed on the subject 
upon which he writes, and his reasons, therefore, for be- 
lieving it to be a portrait of Columbus are entitled to 
respectful consideration. Assuming the portrait to be 
a genuine work of Lotto, as Mr. Van Dyke believes, 
and he is evidently well acquainted wnth the works of 
that master, the first enquiry is, what is known as to its 
history to warrant the belief that Lotto painted it as a 
likeness of Columbus? 

Mr. Van Dyke admits that it cannot be traced beyond 
a certain Italian family that he names, and that at a 
comparatively recent period a person named Gandolfi, 
to whom it had been sold, had it somewhat repaired 
and restored. Mr. Van Dyke further says that from 
1500 to 1503 no one knows where Lotto was, that he 
might have been in Spain and may have sketched 
Columbus from life and never finished the picture until 
1 5 1 2, but that it is more likely that Trivigiano, who was 
an intimate friend of Columbus, and who had an elab- 
orate map of the newly-discovered countries made for 
Domenico Malipiero, a Venetian senator, about 1501, 
brought, with this map, to Malipiero in Venice some 
sketch or portrait of Columbus, as a complement of the 
map, and as a present to the Venetian senator ; as 
Trivigiano, he says, in a translation sent by him to that 
senator of the first book of Peter Martyr's Decades, has 
a description of Colambus in these words, "Christo- 
pher Columbus, a Genoese, high, tall, red, very clever, 
with a long face," which he thinks " is insufficient and 
meaningless, unless accompanied by a sketch or portrait 
of the man, and that it is not impossible that such a 



6o Have we a Portrait of Columbus f 

sketch, or portrait, served as Lotto's model for this larger 
picture." 

This is all matter of conjecture, the bearing of which 
depends altogether upon whether it receives any sup- 
port from the picture itself, which I have not seen. I can 
judge of it only by the engraving that accompanies Mr. 
Van Dyke's article, and deriving my impression solely 
from that, I should say that it does not. 

Mr. Vandyke divides the portraits which are regarded 
as possibilities into two types, the Jovian, of which he says 
"the D'Orchi and the Yanez are examples, and the Ligu- 
rian type, of which the Ministry of Marine portrait of 
Madrid is a later and the Lotto an earlier presentation, 
and perhaps the archetype." He says that "the differ- 
ence between the two men shown in these two portraits 
is slight indeed," and such as " might result from two dif 
ferent artists " viewing the same sitter, or the sitter him- 
self being seen at two different times or ages, or from 
the careless restoration from which both pictures have 
suffered." He was evidently not aware that the 
Ministry of Marine portrait was painted about half a 
century ago, and has undergone no restoration ; that 
the head of Columbus in it was copied from the 
Capriolo engraving of 1596, and that the dress was 
taken from the Yaiiez portrait as the Yanez portrait 
then was. It is better, therefore, to compare this por- 
trait by Lotto with the Capriolo engraving, and upon 
doings so, instead of the difference beingf "sliofht 
indeed," there is a wide and irreconcilable difference. 
The Lotto has not the same round, prominent, bony 
orbit of the eye that is found in the Capriolo engrav- 
ing, in the Altissimo, the d'Orchi and the six other 



Have we a Portrait of Columbus? 6i 

of the nine early portraits to which I have referred ; 
showing that the anatomical structure of this part of 
the head in the Lotto is different from all of the 
others. They have all, as a most marked character- 
istic feature, broad, lofty, arched eyebrows ; whereas, 
in the Lotto, the eyebrow is straight, with a droop 
ing lid, that gives to the whole countenance a sinister 
expression, and instead of the "tinge of melancholy" 
that Mr. Van Dyke sees in the face, the face looks 
to me like that of a man who was frequently, if not 
habitually, cross. 

Jovius, in his eulogy upon Columbus, obviously re- 
ferring to the portrait in the gallery at Como, speaks 
of him as " this man with a most open countenance, of 
unexampled greatness of mind, and with the astonish- 
ing vigor of a great intellect," and in giving thus the 
appearance of a man in a portrait, he was writing about 
what he understood, for we have the authority of Vasa- 
ri that Jovius was a man of much knowledge and 
judgment in matters respecting the arts in Italy. ■^" No 
one would think of designating the personage in the 
Lotto portrait as a man "of a most open countenance," 
while it would not be an inapt designation of the man 
in the earlier portraits I have referred to, including the 
Jovian wood-cut, imperfect as it is. 

There is another difference. All these nine por- 
traits represent a man with not an over-abundant head 
of hair, and that turned up and off from the forehead 
and sides of the face in natural curls. It is, in every 
one of them, what would be called a curly head of hair. 
In the Capriolo engraving the hair is much fuller than 

* Vasari's Lives, etc., Bohn ed., Vol. V., p. 531. 



62 Have ive a Portrait of Cohmibtis ? 

in the others and falls down in long curls. But in the 
Lotto portrait the hair is not curled at all. It is long, 
straight and lank, and instead of springing up from the 
forehead as in the other portraits, it is there divided 
and falls down at the sides, in long masses, close to the 
shoulders, where it is trimmed evenly, so as to be of 
uniform length. In fact, the disposition of it is such as 
to make it so characteristic a feature in the man's 
likeness, that the artist, with a certain freedom of 
touch and considerable artistic skill, has evidently 
given an exact representation of it. It gives 
to the whole face a peculiar expression and in this feat- 
ure is unlike any portrait that I can recall, except that 
of the musician Liszt. Mr. Van Dyke, recognizing, I 
suppose, its difference in this respect from the other 
portraits, cites the authority of Carderera for the fact 
that " in the Columbian period, among the better classes 
the hair was as long as to cover the ears, and cut in a 
horizontal line." But this does not reconcile the differ- 
ence that in the Capriolo engraving, and in the other 
pictures, the hair is curly, whilst in the Lotto picture it 
is straight, and instead of curling upward from the fore- 
head or falling in curls at the sides, as in the other pic- 
tures, it falls down straight in every part. 

There is nothing in this Lotto portrait to indicate 
the man "with marvellous intuitions" of Peschel, or 
" of great energy and an iron will," as stated by Mr. 
Ponce de Leon, which is recognizable however in the 
capacious eyes and strong face that is found in the 
Capriolo engraving and in other of the early portraits. 
I do not see in it, as Mr. Van Dyke does, the "air of 
authority," and the "mariner" and "commander," but 



Have we a Po^^h^ait of Cohunbus ? 63 

simply a gentlemanly-looking personage, with some- 
what of the keen and scrutinizing eye of a scholar, and 
instead of "the reproachful and half disdainful look " 
that Mr. Van Dyke finds in the face, the general ex- 
pression of the face, as it appears to me, to convey it 
by a single word, is peevish. It is not a satisfactory 
picture upon which to found the belief that it is a like- 
ness of Columbus, and it is greatly to be regretted that 
the United vStates Government, in commemoration of 
the Centennial year, should have stamped it on two 
millions of the silver currency of the country, and en- 
graved it upon the postage stamps as a reliable repre- 
sentation of the person of the great discoverer. The 
Ligurian type shown in the portrait of the Ministry of 
Marine, Mr. Van Dyke says, repeats itself in suc- 
ceeding engravings and ideal portraits, and is so famil- 
iar, he says, that painters of the present day adopt it 
in historical paintings of Columbus, and that "it seems 
to be the popular conception of what the discoverer 
ought to be." My investigation of the whole subject 
satisfies me that the popular conception is right, and if 
our Government had followed it, it would have been 
more creditable than to have adopted a portrait that 
has but recently been brought to the public attention 
and will not, as 1 have undertaken to show, bear the 
test of investigation; and with this criticism of the last 
picture that has been brought forward as a portrait of 
Columbus, my address will close. 



H 4/ 



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